Abstract:

The article reports the final results of a research conducted last academic year with students in B1 level classes of French as a foreign language. The study explores the role of Internet, based tools in formal education. More precisely, it speculates how online text processors, with chat features, may enhance Second / Foreign writing competencies within a collaborative environment. It does so by building on previous studies as well as on the printed chat of the group of participants. The students were encouraged to write a text using Google Docs, without face-to-face communication. The paper summarizes previous findings on students’ attempt to write collaboratively, presented in part at EDULEARN 2011, and reports students’ initial attention to form without specific instructions, within an autonomous collaborative context. We will explore the degree to which participants attempt to correct each other is grammar errors. We will also address the level of accuracy these students achieved and the attention they paid to grammar revision versus content revision.

Keywords:

Language teaching, Web 2.0 technologies, collaborative tools, collaborative writing, writing competences, Google Docs.